With Nexus One, Google paves the way for a Microsoft-branded phone

Even though HTC is the company behind the Nexus One, the latest "superphone" is seen as a Google phone not an HTC phone. So if Microsoft ends up fielding the long-rumored Microsoft Pink phone, such a move won't be unprecedented.

Project Pink (if you need a post-New-Year's refresher) is the codename for Microsoft premium mobile services and/or a Microsoft-branded phone that was supposed to be aimed at the teen/20-something consumer market. At the end of 2009, there were plenty of rumors flying that claimed Microsoft had decided against coming out with a Microsoft-branded phone, and that Pink was nothing more than a set of mobile services that would be available for license by all of Microsoft's phone partners.

Microsoft, for its part, has remained mum (publicly) about its Pink project and plans. When asked whether Microsoft planned to work with a single hardware maker -- like Sharp, for instance -- to develop and deliver a Microsoft-branded phone, the Softies were noncommittal in their answers. But many company employees and Microsoft watchers have said they'd be surprised to see Microsoft risk alienating its network of phone partners by annointing one as the maker of the Microsoft phone.

Google, which, like Microsoft, is a developer of a mobile-phone operating system, seemingly has decided any potential alienation is worth the risk. But what's the pay-off, the Financial Times wondered:

"Amidst all the hype about Tuesday’s .. launch of the first Google Phone, there is one overriding question that has gone unanswered: what is the One Big Idea behind this device that is so compelling that Google thinks it’s worth risking its relationship with other handset makers over?

"Just sticking a Google brand on an HTC handset doesn’t add up to much, particularly since some Android phones already carry co-branding.

"Maybe Google thinks it needs more control over the overall experience and has had a bigger hand in the hardware and software design. But it has also worked closely with Motorola and others on previous Android handsets, so how new would this be?"

In Microsoft's case, we know the company is trying to tighten the reins on partners to improve the end-to-end Windows Mobile experience. Microsoft -- whether by Microsoft choice or by partner defection -- is working with fewer mobile-phone makers more closely, sharing chassis designs with them and getting them to build more closely to Microsoft-provided specs. The result, at least in theory, is future  Windows Phones running Windows Mobile might actually use some of the Microsoft-provided user-interface and service elements That wouldn't mean all Windows Phones from the handful of vendors producing them would look exactly alike; There still would be room for someone to do a Zune phone (with music consumption the biggest selling point) or another to do an Xbox phone (a phone that could share Xbox video, gamertags and other gaming elements).

Google execs are playing up its decision to launch a Google phone as "pushing the industry to open up in an attempt to replicate on mobile phones the environment that has allowed the PC-driven Web to grow at explosive rates."

Hmm. Not quite sure I'm following the logic of that one. Isn't controlling the end-to-end experience, a la Apple, the 180-degree opposite of what led the Windows PC market to grow? Apple's continued resistance to allowing third-party vendors to create clones of its PCs or iPhones may create a more consistent environment, but it doesn't create a more open one. And Apple's record on openness on iPhone apps hasn't been one to write home about, either. (In fact, that's another reason Google seems to have gravitated toward a Google phone preloaded with Google apps. Google execs don't want Apple to have the last word in deciding which Google apps and services consumers can and can't use.)

I wonder if Google's decision to offer a Google phone will change anything in Microsoft land, in terms of whether Microsoft will or won't release a Microsoft-branded phone. Google envy could push the Softies to give Pink a new lease on life (if Pink's lease really had expired). Or negative partner/Wall Street/user feedback about Google's decision to compete with other Android phone makers could keep the Redmondians from going anywhere near a Microsoft-branded phone.

Do you think we'll see a Microsoft-branded phone in 2010? Or will Pink be nothing more than a set of partner-provided premium mobile services when it/they debut?